


a sign, an omen, and the vision-2.

by arrowthroughtheheart



Series: gore, angst, and my babies. [2]
Category: ITZY (Band), NCT (Band), Stray Kids (Band), TOMORROW X TOGETHER | TXT (Korea Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Zombies, Author Is Sleep Deprived, Gen, Mentioned NCT Ensemble, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Other Fandoms Not Mentioned in Tags, POV Alternating, Zombie Apocalypse, friendship yay, mentioned violence and little gore, multifandom bullshit, no beta we die like men, nothing about this has any type of romance whatsoever, shit theres a lot of people im tired of tagging, the fucking plot changes every so often im so sorry readers ily
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2020-07-04
Packaged: 2021-03-04 23:48:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25064926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arrowthroughtheheart/pseuds/arrowthroughtheheart
Summary: By the time they had to jump the last obstacle and run all the way back, there’s a thunderstorm that follows. Hyunjin feels bad for Jisung and Felix, who are already standing at the top of the first obstacle, looking down at the first two rankers who are bolting all the way back to the start, since it’ll be a lot more slippery than Hyunjin and Yeji had it, but he’s partially sure they’ll be alright. The third years had some monstrous progress these past few weeks, too, there’s literally nothing for him to worry about. Until maybe, there is.Luckily, or maybe unluckily for him; it doesn’t come from these classes.It comes from outside.
Relationships: Choi Jisu | Lia/Lee Felix (Stray Kids), Choi Jisu | Lia/Shin Ryujin, Ennik Somi Douma | Jeon Somi/Lee Chaeryeong, Han Jisung | Han/Hwang Hyunjin, Hwang Hyunjin & Hwang Yeji, Hwang Hyunjin/Everyone, Hwang Hyunjin/Kim Seungmin, Hwang Hyunjin/Lee Felix, Hwang Yeji/Shin Ryujin, Jung Yoonoh | Jaehyun/Lee Taeyong, Lee Chaeryeong/Shin Ryujin, Lee Taeyong/Suh Youngho | Johnny
Series: gore, angst, and my babies. [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1720744
Comments: 4
Kudos: 11





	a sign, an omen, and the vision-2.

**Author's Note:**

> it has been a while, kids. greetings. aPPARENTLY AFTER WATCHING MORE SCHOOL-BASED ANIMES I AM AWARE THAT THIS IS MUCH MORE LIKE **something else** INSTEAD OF ASSASSINATION CLASSROOM and i am: so. . . confused? inspired?   
> i am also /so/ so sorry i just got back into writing since i also have like fifty five other unfinished projects not related to writing at all and i managed to correct this part in like a whole 24h :')   
> (pls bear w me thank you~)

“If I’m not mistaken,” Hyunjin starts, making sure his voice is filled with enough respect to offend nobody, since the teacher standing in front of him and Yeji right now is Mister Seo - Hyunjin knows better than to piss this one off - but in the middle of his sentence he looked behind the tall man to find the teacher’s office looking empty. “I, uh. . . we, I mean. Me and Yeji. We were uh, called here? By Mister Lee. A few days ago before the dormitory thing was arranged but since we didn’t have time to meet him since he’s been gone for a while now, I just. . . remembered the fact that he wanted us to meet him. My bad, I know I’m supposed to remember earlier but I’m- yeah. Sorry,” Hyunjin finishes, the last few words coming out of his mouth sounding more like a question rather than a statement, but Yeji grows more and more embarrassed beside him and Mister Seo does little to nothing in assuring him that he’s still listening so you can sue Hyunjin for being a nervous wreck. See if he gives a fuck.

“Taeyong’s kinda busy. As you can see,” Youngho stepped aside to let the two see the empty and dim-lighted office where the blinds are rolled all the way down and no light is allowed to enter save for the tiny bits of sun from the cracks of the windows. “He’s not here,” Youngho continues, still looking at his phone while his fingers type mercilessly fast. 

“But I do happen to know what he wanted to say to you. Come. It’s a little too crowded in here. I don’t like how stuffy it feels.”

They walked down the hall, the trio that no one thought they would ever see since even the Hwangs that are known as the first and second ranker are usually scared to death of Mister Seo. Hyunjin caught Felix’s curious eyes as they walked down the stairs, the freckled boy accompanied by none other than Jisung, who let a tiny little snort escape his breath but turned away immediately when he saw Mister Seo looking. 

The atmosphere has drastically shifted after the entire thirty-something citizen of the school watched as Lee Taeyong sliced a head in half a few weeks ago, and Hyunjin can’t decide if it’s for the worse or the better. It ignited something inside the kids’ minds, and their feelings, but it could very well be Hyunjin’s room-reading abilities failing him in bias of the thrilling situation he’s facing right now. The third years, climbing the ranking faster than anyone else since apparently this situation brings out the best in their seniority-drenched selves, comes hand in hand with their entire year gaining a little or a lot more respect from their fellow students a few years below them. It’s a change that most of them welcome with open arms, especially for those like Lia and Seungmin - who were used to not being seen as a threat or even a living, breathing person by their underclassmen. 

But after the iconic, legendary day when they finally saw a bit of action from the redheaded man they called their teacher; they were graced with little to nothing of his existence. He taught them nothing, appeared nowhere, and talked to nobody but his fellow teachers. Jaehyun told the kids about some period of time where Taeyong needs to cool down after getting his fingers warm and drenched in the blood of someone he  _ especially  _ thirsted revenge on, but Hyunjin wondered for a second if Jaehyun meant it metaphorically. The zombie lady was burnt enough that it didn’t bleed. . . almost at all. It’s a little too underwhelming for Hyunjin’s taste since after heeding the warning that came from his teachers about Taeyong -  _ and the zombies  _ \- he definitely expected more gore, so why would Taeyong need a cooling down period?

Then again, he could be very much troubled with whatever it is he’s gone through in the past, so maybe Hyunjin could give it to the old man. 

Youngho settled in the cafeteria, which is odd since the office was a lot more not-crowded if compared to where they are right now; before he slings his feet over one empty bench to sit himself down. The students around that area scattered somewhere else, and in the corner of his eyes, Hyunjin spotted Kim Doyoung with an apron on, serving lunch. Jungwoo is right beside him, wearing a little chef’s hat and a mask, looming over a heating bowl of soup. 

“It’s nothing serious, by the way. Let me show you the files. Hang on,” Youngho typed on his phone even faster before he clicked on something, sliding it all the way to Hyunjin and Yeji’s side of the table, the screen lighting up as it shows them chains of words and the most familiar thing of all in the very bottom of the screen’s corner; a seal. It’s all digitally scanned, apparently, which is a shame since Hyunjin has an ability to know which seal comes from who if he is able to touch its surface. He doesn’t, though. Despite that, the seal looked all too familiar for him, since he’s seen it on his father’s working table or when he sent the most dramatic letters to school - which Hyunjin used to be ashamed of, but now remembering that no one but Lee Taeyong accepted the letters, he felt a little better. So it  _ is  _ his father’s seal, huh?

“What is this?” Hyunjin cringes, picking the phone up with both of his hands, scared that if he did anything bad to it, the rage of Seo Youngho will be dawned upon him. “A legal document. It’s the sole reason why a bunch of you that are here are even allowed to be here. Read it, or don’t read it. All Taeyong wanted to say was that as of now, we’re your legal guardians - and maybe he’d add shit like ‘Your parents are assholes who left you behind for their own sake,’ and in some situations, I’d say he was right, but then again,” Youngho spared Hyunjin a glance, “I figured that not all of them are a bunch of heartless assholes.”

“Abandon us? What are our parents planning to do, anyways?” Yeji asks, tilting her head in confusion - she’s also trying to read the document, but Hyunjin is holding it a little far towards his side, zooming into the seal which looked a little odd, the more he looks at it.

“Not sure. Probably run away? I mean, if we don’t decapitate every single zombie over here first, then there’s a big chance that this apocalypse will be spread all over the world and if that happens there’ll be no where else to run anyways, so if you kids managed to stop the apocalypse, good for you. You’ll come out and be some type of sacrificial hero and that would make the parents who abandoned you be filled with shame and guilt, maybe, but if you don’t end up stopping it? We’ll all die. And maybe they’ll feel guilty too, at the end of the day, but what’s it to you, if you’re dead? You know?” Youngho replies, raising his left eyebrow. Yeji grimaces, tsk-ing her tongue. “I  _ knew  _ I’m adopted,” she chuckles, joking about how little her parents think of her.

This caught Youngho off-guard, though, and it’s probably the only time anyone would ever see him this flustered. “Wait are you for real? Then how do you know you’re not actually related to Hyunjin?”

“N-No, I was-” Yeji stops him with her arms held above the table, her laugh growing nervous, “I was kidding. It was just a joke.”

Youngho’s face turned neutral in a split second, and he hums, bored. “And here I thought we’d be caught up in more drama.”

“That’s it? He’s just trying to tell us that most of our parents booked a flight and got the fuck out of town?” Hyunjin asks, putting the phone down, which Youngho quickly grabs again as his eyes get nailed into whatever it is he’s been doing since this morning. “Mmhm, country,” the teacher nods after correcting Hyunjin, not sparing a single glance at their direction. “They got the fuck out of the country, you know, since the infection rate is going up at a very high rate. You can leave now. Eat, or something. Get ready for your next class. I hope it’s not mine,” Youngho waved an arm to dismiss them from his cafeteria table, and Hyunjin swore he can hear Doyoung chortling down a laugh from the corner. Does everyone in the Secret Service have ultra-hearing or something? It’s kind of unsettling.

“Okay,” Yeji leaves the seat first, tagging Hyunjin along with her, “thank you!”

“This isn’t your first time running the military course, is it?” Doyoung asks as he watches the first two rankers climb up a built-in wooden plank, piled on top of each other about as tall as two more Doyoung(s). Yeji was the one who shook her head in reply, and Hyunjin is just busy trying to steady himself. Balance is the thing he’s mostly shit at, but combined with everything else he’s got, usually the course isn’t the most challenging thing he’d face. 

“Alright. On my mark, then,” Doyoung retreats, pulling out the whistle that he got stored in his pocket. From afar, Hyunjin can see Dong Sicheng approaching with the scoreboard, Nakamoto Yuta right behind him since he’s unable to lift the gigantic thing alone. Yuta tagged along since he’s interested in the third years’ progress, apparently, and Hyunjin can feel his pulse speeding up as he heard Doyoung’s high-pitched whistle and saw Yeji, a few split seconds in front of him.  _ Oh, no she’s not. _

The muscles in his arms are already screaming from shock of the sudden movement, and if Hyunjin didn’t make sure that his body was warmed up and ready to go before this, he’s practically sure he’s going to fall through the gaps of the wooden plank and crack his joints a little from the not-so-high height from the top of the course all the way to the ground. The woods are slightly slippery too, from the rain, and he used it to his long-legs’ advantage as he leaped from one obstacle to the other without fully reaching the end, one-upping Hwang Yeji in the process. 

There’s still little droplets of rain around them, and if Hyunjin didn’t know better, he’d be awfully distracted, but he’s not. The only time he acknowledges them is when he takes a deep breath and he can feel the tiny droplets on the back of his throat, and he  _ almost  _ wheezes a cough. He can’t. Coughing spared Yeji more time to catch up to him, and for now, he’s not ready to be dethroned. So he pushes himself a little bit more.

By the time they had to jump the last obstacle and run all the way back, there’s a thunderstorm that follows. Hyunjin feels bad for Jisung and Felix, who are already standing at the top of the first obstacle, looking down at the first two rankers who are bolting all the way back to the start, since it’ll be a lot more slippery than Hyunjin and Yeji had it, but he’s partially sure they’ll be alright. The third years had some monstrous progress these past few weeks, too, there’s literally nothing for him to worry about. Until maybe, there is.

Luckily, or maybe  _ unluckily  _ for him; it doesn’t come from these classes.

It comes from outside.

.

An emergency meeting in the function room was called that night, about 5PM when the storm is still raging and the doors are already locked, the sky outside dark and windy with the only source of light coming from the function room, where every single soul that are considered highschool students and their teachers are sitting in. Kim Doyoung, accompanied by Jungwoo and Sicheng - maybe Yuta is involved, who knows - are supervising the junior high students since they’re supposed to sleep in sooner than everyone else, not allowed to listen to the announcements. They protested for a bit, but then Yuta being Yuta, the scariest man this world has ever seen, stepped in. From then on, the junior high students were quiet.

“Alright,” Jaehyun speaks, and Hyunjin is a little too busy marvelling how soundproof their function hall is, since the storm is very noisy when they’re each in their own rooms, but right now there’s almost little to no sound aside from the occasional wave of loud downpour that hits the rooftop. “Your first assignment.”

Jaehyun’s words striked something within Hyunjin’s heart as the teacher flipped open a bundle of papers to read through, and he thought over so many times this past month that he’d be excited, that their first assignment is going to be great and mind blowing and. . . and to be quite frank with you, he’s feeling the telltale signs of fear creeping at the back of his spine. He shook them off, looking at Felix, who was looking at him. 

“Only the chosen few will come outside, and the rest of you will stay on guard on the gates just for emergency practice. There’s an increasing influx of the braindeads roaming around, specifically in our area, and the neighboring school offered us to aid them in cleaning up this mess. We heard that these braindeads are the outcome of the soldiers who were on guard outside of the laboratorium the gas was made, and the higher-ups has yet to confirm if they were bitten or were turned into these things after they inhaled a large amount of poisonous gas for a long time, so for the time being, you’re going to wear safety masks going outside.”

“Do not worry about the poison being spread through air, though,” Jaehyun continues reading from the document he’s been sent, “our gates are not only going to act as a barrier to hold out the braindeads now, since it’s also turned into filters to avoid the poison from wafting in. Hm,” he raised an eyebrow, slightly impressed. “The academy that asked for our aid is the  _ #D06 Academy,  _ I’m not. . . really sure what its name was before we changed the concept to numbers and words, but it’s the one not so far from here? I’m sure some of you here would’ve opted to go there if you’re physically driven since it’s centered around sport? Basketball, if I’m not mistaken?”

“Old Jaehyung can’t do shit on his own, huh?” Taeyong chimes in, suddenly emerging from the doors that were shut, and almost immediately Hyunjin can hear just how noisy the thunderstorm was outside. A shiver ran up his spine. Jaehyun chuckles slowly to retaliate Taeyong’s entrance, but says nothing further. “It’s been a while since we heard of him,” the redhead mutters, turning to the students, most are wide-eyed since it’s been almost a whole month since they haven’t seen him around. “What do you say, kids?” Taeyong asks, cocking his head to the side, “Should we or should we not help them?”

“Uuuh. . . Mister Lee?” Jaehyun starts questioning Taeyong’s means, scratching the back of his head while Youngho sighs. They didn’t mention that it was an optional yes or no assignment, so Hyunjin finds it intriguing that they’re being asked about it right now. “I know,” Taeyong cuts the younger off, not even looking at him, “I will take care of the paperworks if the kids decide to refuse the assignment,” he continues, “I want them to know they are able to make choices, even when the situation is as dire as this one.”

“Shouldn’t we also tell them what would happen if they refuse, though?” Jaehyun shots back, though his voice sounds like a blur in the back of most of the student’s minds.

_ Choices?  _ Yeji felt herself being taken back to all the times she’s thought of that word before, what it means and all the ways she’s never managed to learn it. There are large holes left in her life since she’s been acting as the head of the little family she and her little sister acknowledge, since their parents seem to enjoy playing the part of people that became so ignorant that it hurts a  _ lot _ if they try to include said parents in their little family. So they didn’t. 

What kind of parents stopped caring about their daughters when they saw how futile their effort was in achieving a son? 

The first time Yeji realized that her parents desperately tried to cage their children away from making their own decisions was a  _ long  _ time ago, probably. No, no.  _ Definitely.  _

She was four. There’s just something so magical and cheerful about life when she finds out that her mother was pregnant, and that she was getting a sibling. She’s always wanted a little sister, another one that would play dolls with her and whose hair she can braid and would share her interest in dressing up, maybe even listen to her talk about her love life in the future. She dreamt of the day where her mother would come home from the hospital with her younger sibling for weeks on end, and one day, her parents  _ did  _ go to a hospital. 

But it was only a reminder that Yeji’s life was never for her to lead. Not entirely.

The baby that was growing wasn’t a baby her parents wanted, since it was a baby girl. There were a lot of times where Yeji heard her parents fought every single day about the fetus growing inside her mothers stomach, all before that one fateful day, but Yeji never cared so much since she was caught up in watching princesses dancing on her TV screen and dreaming of the day where the baby will come out. It didn’t even matter to her that it could be a brother. She figured that she was just lonely, in need of a friend.

But then her parents came home a few days after that, and Yeji managed to run all the way to them even though her nanny at the time tried to stop her.  _ Where’s the baby?  _ She remembered asking. They couldn’t answer. They couldn’t.

She found out years later, coming home from school after a specific general science lesson about babies normally growing for nine months inside the belly, digging out all the diary books she’s kept all those years ago, thanking god that she’s a fast learner since she was able to at least scribble the dates correctly at the far right corner of her diary back in the days. Her sister, who was born two years before this, was a very adorable two-year-old by now, and she grew very attached to Yeji. With the toddler by her side and her fingers trembling through the old diary books, Yeji tried her best to not jump to conclusions.

But there were no conclusions to jump to, since the evidence was clearly there. Yeji kept track of the baby’s development since the first day her mother revealed that she was pregnant. Things she asked her mother about, like ‘is it moving?’ ‘can it sing?’ and every other stupid question she could possibly think of when she was four. But then the tracks stopped with a little sad sketch of a round face crying in the corner after four months of entry.  _ Four months,  _ she thought,  _ it stopped after four months before they told me the baby was no longer there.  _ That’s a whole lot too soon, even if the baby was to be born prematurely. 

She kept it to herself. 

Jiae finally went to an official school when she turned six, and Yeji walked her all the way to elementary. Their parents were out and about by then, and the last thing she heard from them on the day Jiae got to school was the fact that they’re visiting their father’s younger sister, who had a son a few months ago. Yeji wanted to flip their parents off for choosing to go somewhere while their younger daughter went through something as important as going to school for the first time, but Jiae didn’t seem to mind. Of course she didn’t. Apparently, their parents’ love meant little to nothing for her. She rarely even met them.

Yeji met Hyunjin at the first day of Junior High. It was the same Academy they are in now, and they talked after noticing the fact that they have the same last name and almost the same exact eyes. Science lessons further down the line agitated her even more, since none of these lessons proved that babies can just disappear and shrink back into their mothers’ stomach. But then again, Yeji remembered that there’s a weird type of scar on her mother’s stomach, even though there’s literally no reason it should’ve been there. Both her and Jiae were born normally, so why the scar?

She remembered asking Hyunjin this, and the boy couldn’t answer, so they went to the teacher together, hand in hand like the twins from the Shining. The teacher looked at them with worried eyes, and once she explained that unborn babies can possibly be murdered and the word ‘abortion’ came out of her mouth, Yeji felt like her entire world was spinning in an axis she’s never heard of before. The teacher explained about more things afterwards, and Yeji provided more questions.  _ But why?  _ She thought, since Jiae is also a girl and they didn’t. . . didn’t  _ kill  _ her. Which is good, amazing even. Yeji can’t think of a world without her sister, but, how? Why? Why did they choose to do  _ that  _ to the baby? Someone Yeji’s never met before, but could’ve? She could’ve if they didn’t. . . if they didn’t  _ kill  _ her.

She remembers in very high contrast how she ran home almost immediately, kidnapping her little sister from the class she was attending to continue running home, with only one thing on her mind. 

_ “Murderer!”  _ she remembered screaming, making a mess in the kitchen, the living room, everywhere. She kept screaming, the anger and doubt and sadness piled up into this big messy ball of disappointment that exploded out of nowhere, only increasing when she sees the face of her parents looking at her, horrified. Their mother is crying. Their father is angered and shocked, petrified on how she knows how to accuse them of all these things. What did she know?  _ How  _ did she know?

A dam broke inside Yeji’s brain when she saw their father try to separate a very terrified but confused Jiae from her raging self, and before she knew it, her father was on the floor, nose cracked after his head hit the corner of the table. The only evidence Yeji got that she was the one who did it was her hand floating a few inches away from her father’s half-broken face before she ran away with Jiae in her arms.

Hyunjin tried his best to coax his mother into letting them in, and even though Miss Hwang was very worried about what happened to the other Hwangs, she did finally let Yeji and Jiae in. 

Rumours circulated at school the next day, and Yeji was summoned to the teacher’s room to talk with their psychologist. 

Choices.

None of their lives were ever a choice they made on their own. Not Yeji, not Jiae, not the unborn baby that was supposed to be here with them today, alive and well. They’re all just pawns their parents decide was useless after a few tries in understanding them, useless since girls can’t continue the family’s heritage, useless since they’re soft and graceful and not smart and tall and cunningly handsome. Yeji has never been handed a choice before, especially when they were forced to move out.

She had a small fight with Hyunjin the day before her family was forced to move out for a bit, and she tried to fight her way out of their home and say goodbye to Hyunjin - though she never succeeded. She left then, at the last day of their Junior High, with Hyunjin waiting for her to return and join their little reunion a few months after, even when he’s got into the same Highschool he and Yeji were supposed to attend together, Yeji wasn’t allowed to choose her friends over her family.  _ Family.  _ As if she’s ever going to voluntarily choose her actual family over the friends she’s made throughout the years. The only choice Yeji has ever made was the one thing she kept alive in her heart, which told her that she does have a family aside from Jiae. She has a chosen family she kept near her heart, even though before this, before the first day of the last highschool year, she might not even exist beside them.

The memories zoomed out little by little as she took in her surroundings back on, resurfacing as she took in the appreciative but dependable gaze Taeyong sent their way. Yeji might not know what happened to these people before they were assigned to this place to look for a bunch of children as their mentors, but she knows for damn sure they’re doing a lot better as legal guardians than her parents ever would. Little mistakes along the way are a lot better than giving up just because you made one, gigantic, irreversible mistake, afterall. She wished her parents would’ve done that instead of giving up on both her and Jiae after that one time she headbutted their father before pushing his head onto their dinner table. But those things are in the past, and right now Yeji needs to do something to protect her friends, if not for the world and Jiae, who is stuck in a Junior High somewhere else, also left behind by their parents. 

When an option is given to her, she’ll make her decision something she won’t look back and be ashamed of.

“Alright-” Jaehyun takes in a deep breath, looking around the room with his eyes wide as if he’s trying to send signals to the students.  _ You might want to be a little more intimidating, though, Jaehyun. Or else it might not work.  _ “How do we do this? Should we vote? With papers? By raising our hands?”

..

It’s the school Jeno and Jaemin went to, Hyunjin thought as they were shown some more pictures of the other school’s core team that are about to be sent outside with  _ #0127’s  _ core team. Both Jeno and Jaemin were included in the pictures, alongside some other kids Hyunjin recognized from Jeno’s very active photography account he usually uploads his activities onto. They look unabashedly more advanced than their core team, obviously since their arms and legs are a little more buffed up and look like they’re ready to kill when compared to their own. Obviously, since it’s a school made up of athletes before they were zombie-killers, but still. Hyunjin wonders why they even need help.

“Oh?” Yeji made a noise when she recognized the two on the screen, inching closer to Hyunjin. “Jeno and Jaemin went to a sports-based school? Cool,” she hums when Hyunjin nods, filling her in about the encounter he made with the two the other day before they dropped everything in their life to go live in school. Literally. Maybe to kids like Jeno and Jaemin, who are aiming to be professional athletes, there was no difference at all when they were forced to live in their school dorms, since even Felix and Lia - who are athletes of their school and are used to fluctuating schedules of their practices which usually last until the ass crack of night, so they basically live in school either way - thinks that the transition isn’t too disturbing. Maybe when this whole thing is over, the ones who are passionate about something in their life could continue chasing their dreams. Maybe it could be over. 

“The  _ #D06  _ was already summoned to wipe out some places other than what we’re heading towards, so they tower over you in a little level called professionalism, though it was short-lived since their Captain, Lee Jeno, decided to dismantle a grenade and ended the chase before it even begun,” Youngho adds while he zooms in on a problematic picture that looks like its cameramen was shaking only moments after the grenade blew up. Jeno still looks like Jeno, though, since it’s not that hard to make out his facial features even though the lens is a little blurred. “And yes,” Youngho nods, though no one was asking, “I said chase. They can run now, since these new brain-munchers were turned quite recently, on top of the fact that they used to be soldier humans.”

Hyunjin grimaces. Well ain’t that fun to hear when it’s only a few days from their grand debut as zombie-killers?

“But worry not, kids. They don’t fight back. The only thing they’re moving to do is to  _ bite  _ you, and they’re rotten enough inside to be taken out with one blow, whether it be a grenade or a sword. Bullets don’t really work since they’re basically walking corpses, but if you use them to hold them off somewhere since you’re unable to kill or is lacking in the right weapons to do so while waiting for backup, be our guest,” Jaehyun adds, “but make sure you give yourself and the braindeads a little something called distance, okay?”

“When you walk?” Taeyong chimes in from his squatting position, running over the document that was sent to the HQ then sent back to them. “Make sure you don’t make unnecessary noises. Clamp your mouth shut when you breathe unless you’re at least blocked by a building to cover you from their sight, since  _ #D06  _ only reported on the braindeads’ hearing being very fully functional, but I won’t risk the fact that some of you might be dumb enough to attack from their front.”

“Don’t fucking attack from their front,” Taeyong adds, standing up. “These are ex-soldiers, and as far as I know, it has only been a month and a half since the explosion happened, which meant it’s even shorter since they either inhaled the gas or got bitten. Their muscles might still be strong enough to hold you down, I’m especially talking about the smaller ones, and if you’re stacked under an agitated, angry, zombie, I wouldn’t hold it against you all if you die. I mean I would pray that you all rest in peace, but I wouldn’t stop myself from telling your corpse, ‘I told you so.’”

“The only one capable enough to attack from the front while the zombies are already looking is Shin Ryujin, wait- don’t act so shocked yet- since she’s light enough to have a pretty high jump that would shock them even when she comes from where they are able to see, yet she’s also considered muscular enough to slice someone’s neck in one swing of her sword, since that’s a weapon she’s been specializing in since we started. Unless you are Shin Ryujin - the short haired girl over there, don’t try and do shit from the front. If the zombies somehow spot you in the distance, you either run until you find Shin Ryujin and make her lend you a hand, or find someone to kill the braindead from behind them while you serve as a decoy. Am I clear?” the redhead asks, completing some sketches he’s been focusing on since the beginning.

“If any of you try out some funny shit and I’m forced to lose someone in our first assignment I swear,” Taeyong waves her finger around, sparing a glance to the students before returning to look at his paper, and with a very small voice, whispers, “I swear I’m gonna fucking cry.”

It  _ almost  _ made Hyunjin snort if not for Yeji chuckling beside him, stopping herself from laughing a little too loud.

Jaehyun clears his throat, sparing a glance to the door, which creaked slightly, exposing a Nakamoto Yuta standing in the hallway. The former continues when his eyes flutter back to look at his students, most of them frozen in their seats.

There are still murmurs about this entire situation. Their initial thoughts are all the same, but only one Han Jisung is brave enough -  _ or fast enough  _ \- to shoot the question. “I thought this is an assignment already? We can refuse assignments?” 

Jaehyun nods. 

“We were offered to help them. They don’t really need our help seeing as they’re the second best in this entire country’s new ranking system. They have pretty powerful students and equally smart supporters since their classes are massive and they’re equally separated as fighters and informants. It’s an offer for us to help them to help  _ ourselves,  _ or more-so-likely to give us a political. . . boost,” Jaehyun grits his teeth together, seemingly displeased, “and maybe their head teacher is pissed since all the people do are laugh at the ‘rich kids’ these days and their school is filled with filthy rich families like you all are, so he wants to prove something by involving you all. Either way, we’d be heavily held accountable for an answer today, at least.”

There’s another stop, heavy and filled with expectation. Jaehyun continues again, “So if you do accept this, you’re the ones who are benefited from it. If you refuse, there’s. . . no such thing as a backlash, but maybe no one at all will ever know you and your chances of meeting your family again will be diminished to as little as possible,” he sits on a chair he pulled out of nowhere, “since the cruel boss of ours care about only the best of the best. He’s a dick like that.” 

With the meeting hall now filled with even louder mumbling, Jaehyun chuckles, fishing out the papers he was supposed to read, laying them flat on his lap. “We never said it’s all paradise and rainbows, now have we?”

Hyunjin looks around when Jaehyun looks like he’s got nothing else to say, and Taeyong is just lounging around in the background, Youngho in tow. The tallest between the trio is handing Yuta - who just came into the room with expectant-filled eyes and a knowing smile - a little bucket filled with pen and small bits of ripped papers. “Come on, Mr. President,” Yuta said annoyingly, nudging Hyunjin’s side as he looked up with questioning eyes. The middle-school teacher continued, “Tell your friends they need to vote anonymously. They don’t have to feel bad about dooming your chances of being happy ever again just because they’re scared.”

Hyunjin takes this with a grain of salt before he stands up, numbed while he walks here and there to explain what his peers need to do since for  _ some  _ people, him included; reuniting with their family isn’t a prime option they’re looking forward to.

The bucket was filled, the pens were returned, and Hyunjin handed the option-filled bucket over to Jaehyun, who didn’t even spare a glance at him. Minutes passed as they counted the little paper bits earnestly, a little too serious for Hyunjin’s liking. Did they also not want their students to take part in this? This entire thing is a little odd.

A decision was made at last when the chart of ‘yes’ overpowered the ‘no’ with five anonymous votes, and Hyunjin can feel Felix’s shoulder slumping beside him. “Shit,” the freckled boy curses silently, eyes avoiding the front of the hall to type on his phone instead. 

They’re going to help  _ D06. _

“Alright,” Jaehyun says, “I’ll read the core team out loud. Just a quick reminder that this isn’t anything permanent, and the line-up might change further down the line regarding how fitting some people are for some assignments. Okay? Assignment one; be an aid to the  _ #D06 Drain.  _ The Core Team consists of Hwang Hyunjin, Hwang Yeji, Jeon Somi, Lee Felix, Shin Ryujin and Choi Beomgyu.”

There’s a very visible shock that came from the other side of the room, possibly Chaeryeong when she finds out that most of her friends are going out there. Hyunjin saw how Lia tried to give the other three a smile out of empathy, but even he can see how the smile didn’t come from somewhere in her heart. It’s a little too obvious, especially seeing how forced it is. But it  _ is  _ a possibility that they didn’t need it to be genuine so much as they needed reassurance. 

“The Captain and Vice Captain are still based on the rank and scoring we have previously stated, and that’s about it.”

“Gather ‘round, Core Team, I have something to tell you,” Taeyong summons them, walking away from the bright function hall to the back, the creepy and dark-ish place Hyunjin aforementioned. “Shin Ryujin and Choi Beomgyu are involved in this since they play a big part in slicing the heads off of the braindeads, but they’re something I would call the final piece of a planned attack. You see, since there’s no telling that the braindeads will attack you one by one and if we’re aiding  _ #D06  _ and they promise to help us in return, but we have to do everything to make sure that our own people aren’t hurt, though seeing how we’re going out there to assist another academy, protecting our own is only second in priority compared to cleaning up the area they want us to clean,” Taeyong continues under his breath, “or so we’ve been told.”

“There’s a possibility that they’re going to separate us by blocks since most of the zombies roamed to an upper-class household with some houses that are yet to be vacant and that’s the ultimate reason why we need to clean it and evacuate people, so if you six move as a team most of the time, here’s what I want you to do,” Taeyong made Youngho spread out a blueprint that has a printout of a map accompanied with what looks like their practice dummies, but doing poses in a few separate points across said map. “You separate three and three to sneak from the right and from the left, but it has to be equal. Hyunjin and Yeji are equally as strong, so is Somi and Felix, and so is Ryujin and Beomgyu. Those with the same statistical strength can  _ not  _ be on the same side, but I’ll let Hyunjin decide who that would be when he gets to the crime scene, but the point is; it has to be equal. Okay?” 

“And then once you’ve arrived in a place crowded by the braindeads, you launch your attack. Preferably one of the strongest four should begin for a 50:50 chance that the rest have enough time and energy to back them up, but  _ never  _ make Ryujin and Beomgyu land a hit first since their abilities make them a great team to pick things up only after things get rough, since Beomgyu is gifted with a speed-induced attack that will be over before you know it and Ryujin is able to be a decoy  _ and  _ lash out an attack even while the enemy is after her,” Taeyong rubs the back of his neck, “I know I didn’t specify this before while recruiting you, but Beomgyu, I want you to help Ryujin if she’s crowded by more than enough braindeads she can handle. If she pulls their attention away from wherever you will be hiding later on, you can sneak up on them just fine, am I correct?”

Beomgyu nods, though a little shaky.

Hyunjin looks to his side, familiarizing his eyes with how Beomgyu looks. It’s not the first time he’s seen the younger kid since Beomgyu was the same kid who stumbled across the wrong floor on his first day as a first year looking for his classroom, and Hyunjin made Seungmin take the younger to the teachers’ office since apparently his lost-soul didn’t know where either of those places were located - but if he had to communicate with Beomgyu throughout the next few days leading up to the mission, he doesn’t want to call him someone else’s name by mistake just because his face was awfully  _ non _ familiar. Beomgyu looks like he can hold a stance on his own pretty well, and despite an obvious jitter of nerve searing through his body, he looks calm and stable enough to be considered okay-ish. Or maybe even  _ good. _ Hyunjin can work with that. More like he  _ has  _ to, but he also needs to try to tolerate more people than just those he’s used to affiliate with. 

“It shouldn’t be that hard to regroup after you win over a few, but let’s just say you’re all separated and are placed on different units, mixed with people from over there, the  _ D06  _ kids you’ve never met or talked to,” Taeyong shifts to his other foot, leaning over the table with a gloomy look on his face, “what do you do, then?”

Hyunjin takes this as a challenge, a sharp kind of glint crossing his teacher’s face for a split second as he takes in his students’ facial expressions. It’s a hopeful look despite how ready his stance is for disappointment, since the answer Lee Taeyong is waiting for has never been explicitly explained thoroughly in any type of class or behaviour programs. It’s always been subtle, but he looks like he’s oddly expecting it to be clearly understood.

Despite not having any type of experience with facing Mr. Lee while he’s fired up and ready for battle as he is now, Hyunjin knows what he wants. Hyunjin has always been able to read everyone like a book, and a secret-agent-veteran is no different, though he’s sure his redheaded teacher and his friends have a lot more layers to unfold.

So Hyunjin answers the best he can, with what his observant nature provides for him.

“We better  _ not  _ go against them since we did agree to help them. But we’d let them know we also have our own priorities sorted out,” he speaks up, barely swallowing his nerves when there’s at least three pairs of eyes floating to watch his movements. “To put it simply, whatever happens anywhere, we better prioritize our own.”

No one spoke for a moment, and the only thing Hyunjin is focused on is the soft thudding of rain droplets against their roof, drowned by their velvet walls. 

“You heard your leader,” Taeyong clasps both his hands together, making a move to dismiss the core group he summoned into a more secluded meeting before he drags his own slightly sagging body back to the front of the hall, determined to say something exciting.

“Now, now,” he lifts up his fists like a kindergarten teacher, “let’s get back to outdoor classes!”

Though the storm-filled weather disagreed, there’s nothing else anyone can do when their teachers led them outside to the noisy and windy rained-on fields to proceed with their curriculum. They have less than a week to catch up to how  _ excellent  _ the other academy’s reputation is, and apparently, not even a rainstorm is about to let them be stopped.

**Author's Note:**

> thEY'RE GOING ON AN ' EXCITING ' TRIP NEXT TIME !!!  
> theres also going to be a fucking ocean of new people in the next one pray for my sanity please   
> .  
> also is THIS part counted as filler i actually dont fucking know what im writing anymore hello


End file.
